


Nine Worthies

by scatteringmyashes



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Afterlife, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Everyone is Dead, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Black Eagles Route, Gen, Guilt, Heavy Angst, M/M, Purgatory
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-13
Updated: 2020-04-13
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:02:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23133625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scatteringmyashes/pseuds/scatteringmyashes
Summary: Dimitri dies. So does everyone else. And by a river, he wakes.A look at guilt, friendship, loyalty, and what happens when you're in the afterlife.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Blue Lions Students, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Glenn Fraldarius, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Dedue Molinaro
Comments: 11
Kudos: 100





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! So this is a bit of a different fic than I usually write. I hope that you like it and that it's at least semi-interesting? It originally was going to be a lot more action and such and then it quickly turned into a character summary, so there's that.
> 
> You can see there's going to be three chapters -- if the character doesn't show up at first, rest assured they will later :)
> 
> Enjoy!

Dimitri is dead. He can remember the rain on his skin. The mud beneath his boots. The red smeared on his armor. The bitterness of defeat mingled with anguish, the knowledge that everything he had done was for naught. That Edelgard had destroyed Faerghus.

He remembers the hatred that had poured through his veins and turned the taste in his mouth to ash and the cold on his skin to fire. He can still feel the moment of white-hot pain before nothing. 

Nothing. 

Death does not feel like nothing. It does not feel like fire either.

He takes his time opening his eyes. Now that he is dead, there is no point in rushing. It sounds peaceful for now, an illusion he assumes to make his waking in hell that much more disturbing. He can hear birds in trees, wind rustling grass, and a soft flow of a winding river as it passes by in the distance. This, he can only assume, will be torn away from him as soon as his eyes are opened even a mere sliver. 

So he lays in what feels like grass and he breathes in what smells like flowers and listens to a river babble on. He wonders if he is alone. He supposes it does not matter. 

He has been alone for so long and he will be alone for the rest of eternity while his soul burns in the fires of torment. It is only right, after all he has done and failed to do. 

There is little point in prolonging the inevitable, so he opens his eyes and looks around. 

He is sitting in a field of flowers. There is a forest to one side and a river on the other. There is no one else in sight. The sun is distant, half-hidden by clouds, almost overcast but not quite. He can feel the wind on his face. It's cold, but he realizes that he is dressed in simple but warm clothes that keep the worst of the chill at bay. 

_Considering this is hell,_ Dimitri thinks, _there really isn't much brimstone._ He stands. No bolt of lighting strikes him down. No demon splits the earth and consumes his flesh or tears his spirit in two. There isn't even any shaking. 

He should be in agony, at the very least, but his wounds from battle have been healed and even the cloud in his head seems to have been lifted in a way that only the presence of Dedue could aid with in the past.

_Dedue… why did you do that…_ Dimitri closes his eyes, suddenly assaulted by the images of his dearest friend transforming himself into a Demonic Beast. The pain… the madness… and Dedue's final words… 

They echo back in his mind, a noise bouncing off cave walls but only growing louder rather than softer. Dimitri can feel whatever is left of his heart shattering, scattering to the wind like the ashes from his burnt corpse must be doing back in the mortal realm. He can feel the unsaid words, the broken promises, the stolen hope — it all threatens to crush him in death as it did in life. 

_This is hell,_ Dimitri decides, _because only in hell must I continue the agony of existence._

#

He is not consumed by atrophy or nothingness nor is he slowly wasting away from starvation or thirst. Birds do not come to peck at his eyeballs, snakes do not slither out to bite his legs and arms, and beasts do not come to rend him asunder. Thunder does not strike him, rain does not fall, fire does not consume him. 

Hell is dull. 

There. He said it. Let the Goddess, if she is even here, finally blast him from eternity and let his endless suffering begin as it were meant: not with this peaceful river winding nearby and birds singing in trees, but with pain and misery and true torment. 

Nothing happens. Nothing has happened for three days. Dimitri is bored. He sat down on day two, though his limbs were not tired. He hasn't grown hungry or thirsty, nor has he felt the need for rest, though he did succumb to the monotony and closed his eyes for a few hours, only to realize he was not falling asleep no matter how many calm breaths he took or how peaceful he made his mind. 

Dimitri stands up. He squints at the forest. It seems timid, but he does not quite want to venture through it, still certain there must be beasts or some evil lurking just out of sight. He glances to the river, with its clear waters and soothing sound. It reminds him of fishing back at Garreg Mach — at least, his attempts at fishing, which were more often than not unsuccessful but still entertaining. 

He feels his heart tug with longing for the simpler days, but they really were just an illusion, weren't they? Life has never been simple for him. Even before Duscur, he was still a prince. He would always take up the mantle of king and he was treated as such. It just wasn't until Duscur that he really understood what that meant, that being prince is so much more than visiting friends and deciding to be a good person. 

The truth is pushed aside as Dimitri walks over to the river, crushing wildflowers understep. He has boots on, but he takes them off once he reaches the water's edge. He carefully sets one foot in the river, then a second. The flow is not so strong as to push him aside, but it feels soothing across his toes. It's cold, but not icy. Refreshing. He's not thirsty, but he carefully cups his hands in the water — and he isn't wearing gloves or gauntlets, a rarity in the last days of war — and takes a sip. 

It's clean, as far as he can tell. It would be a rather sad hell if he were to die from sickness, though perhaps that's what he deserves. Maybe he is not even worth the usual flames of agony, instead cursed to die repeatedly from increasingly dull and inane reasons. 

There was an opera he watched, once, back before the war. It was about a man who was guided through seven levels of hell, where a traitorous angel was locked away on the last level. Instead of fire, it had been the bitter frost of betrayal that haunted the angel. 

Dimitri doesn't remember which level was filled with fields and rivers and forests, but he supposes that it must be one of the worst ones. He has far too much time on his hands, after all.

With his free time, he first makes a hatchet. It's more difficult than he thought it would be, but he finds some good rocks and breaks a few tree branches off with his bare hands and then lashes things together with some reeds from the river. It's ugly but, as a few swings prove, sturdy enough to use. 

He has a small fire that night. It feels warm, but comfortingly so. Of course, this is hell and he does not feel the need for it in the first place, but it makes him feel a bit of… a bit of hope. Maybe he was wrong and this is something different. Something between hell — which is what he deserves — and heaven — that which he cannot even aspire towards. Maybe his soul can still be saved. 

_Please, you must fulfill your wishes!_

_I failed…_

_So… this is how it ends…_

_I'm sorry, Dimitri, I can't seem… to stay on my feet…_

_Your highness… Dimitri…_

Dimitri laughs. He can never be saved. What a foolish idea. 

Still, by the river, he builds a shelter. 

#

The first person to approach his base is a familiar redhead in a simple blue dress. Dimitri feels his eyes widen, his breath leave his body. If Annette is here, then… 

"Oh, Dimitri—" Annette hugs him even as he starts crying. "It's okay. I'm not in pain anymore."

"You — you _died,_ " Dimitri says between grit teeth. He holds her close, as if his embrace has done anything other than poison and hurt his friends. "I — I'm sorry, Annette. I failed you! I failed our friends. I failed everyone—"

"Shush. It's not your fault. You didn't start this war." Annette frowns. "I… don't like being dead. But it's pretty here, at least." She looks at his little shelter. "You built a cabin." 

He supposes that _cabin_ is a bit of a nice term for it. He has four uneven walls kept together with dried mud and river reeds. The ceiling is a bunch of grass lashed together with, obviously, more reeds. It's barely tall enough for him to stand in. The only thing qualifying as furniture is a small bedroll made of damn reeds. 

Dimitri hopes that the reeds aren't some symbol of the temptation of mankind or whatnot. He certainly has failed in preserving them, if that is the goal. 

"Did you want to come in?" Dimitri asks. He feels foolish all of a sudden, blubbering over his friend because of something he did. It isn't her burden to take the guilt from his shoulders. He's already asked too much of her. "I… it isn't much, but…" 

Annette smiles at him. "I think that I would like to see the river. I've been walking for a few days now. It would be nice to rest." 

They sit by the river together. Annette takes her sandals off and places her feet in the water. Dimitri watches in silence. 

"So Fhirdiad fell." He doesn't ask for details. She nods. 

"I'm sorry—"

"No. I should have stopped her. You should never have died." He draws his eyes away. He wipes the tears that threaten to fall, as if banishing them will mean they never existed. "This is my fault. If I had known earlier, I could have stopped her before this began. I was so close, back in the monastery—"

"None of us knew. By the time we did…" Annette reaches out to place a hand on his shoulder, but stops. "It wasn't your fault. You led us the best you could have. She is the one who decided to spread war across Fódlan."

"But you still died from my weakness." Dimitri hopes that the bitterness in his voice is not misunderstood, but it seems that everything he does is doomed to end in failure regardless of what he attempts. "A better leader, a better man, could have saved us all." _Could have saved Dedue._

Annette does not answer. Dimitri is glad for her company, but then realizes how twisted that is for him to think that. He deserves isolation, boredom, nothing — Annette is good, she is _good,_ and yet she is trapped here with him. 

_Maybe hell is what I have inflicted on my friends,_ Dimitri thinks. 

"When I was a little girl, I always wanted to go camping," Annette said. "But my mother said it was not a very ladylike thing to do, and my father was never there to take me." 

Slightly perturbed, Dimitri chooses his next words carefully. 

"Gilbert is a good man, but he… he should have stayed with you," he replies. He can remember happiness brought from his loyal knight's company. The knowledge that he was joyful while Annette was sad just cements how wrong he is. It seems like his existence really can do nothing but hurt others.

Not for the first time, Dimitri wishes that he did not have to be. 

"He always wanted to do what was best for the kingdom. He loved you like a son." Annette bites her lip. "I like to think that his stories, when he did come back, was his way of telling me that he could care." 

"Stories mean nothing in the absence of truth." 

"I guess." Annette scrunches her dress up before smoothing it back down. Much like the material Dimitri wears, it is neither rags nor silks. Dimitri doesn't know enough about fabric, but he supposes it's comfortable enough. His clothes never seem to attract dirt or gain disgusting scents even with prolonged wear, which is more important than if they are cotton or whatnot.

Dimitri wonders what hell allows for consideration as to the garments. Annette's next words catch him off-guard. 

"You were a happy boy, weren't you?"

"I suppose." Dimitri doesn't remember. He can't remember much from before Duscur. 

"I often thought that, one day, my father would take me to the capital too. Then I'd have a brother and a father." Annette laughs. "It was a silly idea." 

Dimitri finds himself smiling. It's an odd feeling. He doesn't recall the last time he smiled. 

"I wanted siblings. I knew, of course, that my mother had died and that Stepmother had another child, but we weren't close. She…" Dimitri trails off. It hurts to think that, in another life, maybe he and Edelgard— 

No. No use in thinking that way. 

"I would have been a great sister," Annette says, lightly pushing Dimitri's shoulder. "We would have explored every secret spot in the castle and stolen extra sweets all the time." 

"The cooks liked me," Dimitri reminisces, looking up at the perpetually overcast sky. If he concentrates, he can just remember the taste of sweet buns. When was the last time he tasted anything? _A lifetime ago,_ he thinks morosely. "I think it was because I'd eat anything they put in front of me."

"Well, that never changed," Annette teases. "Even if Flayn was cooking, you'd eat every last bite. I don't think anyone else could!" Her smile begins to fade. "I heard that she and Seteth ran from battle. I hope they're okay." 

Dimitri remembers talking with Flayn. That she would want to be a happy memory, if she had to be one at all. He wonders if Seteth ran because of cowardice or because of bravery. Before he died, Dimitri would have thought only a coward could run. Now, thinking of his own mistakes, he admits that maybe he could have been braver in defeat than in death. 

Not like it makes much of a difference now. 

"A little sister would have been nice," Dimitri confesses. "But I would only have hurt you. I was not very good company after the massacre." 

"That's okay. My father wasn’t either." 

The river runs clear and calm. There are no fish, a fact that Dimitri is quite confident in after spending day eight searching. He also has not actually seen any birds, despite them chirping near constantly, nor has he seen tracks of wild animals despite the knowledge that this is a fertile land. More odd, but he has not even seen a bee or a fly or an ant. 

Hell, he decided on day ten, is empty save for himself. Then again, Annette is here and she does not seem to be one of his usual ghosts. In fact, he hasn't heard from them since he died. Another odd fact about hell to add to the list of odd facts that he has been accumulating. 

It is difficult to tell how much time has passed. The sun does not so much as set as it dims. Dimitri doesn't sleep so even his assumptions of days passed are loose at best. Maybe he has been here fifteen days or fifteen years. Maybe Annette isn't here at all and this is just a mad hallucination — just a more pleasant one than he usually encounters. 

"Have you seen anyone else?" He asks, terrified of the answer. 

"No," Annette replies. "But I… I thought that we'd all be here." 

Dimitri closes his eyes. He does not know if he is selfish enough to want to see Dedue again or terrified. 

"That is possible." He swallows. He stands. His back is hunched. It's hard to stand as a proud king when he has nothing to be proud of. "You should go." 

"What?"

"I said, you should go." 

"Why? I've only just arrived. You haven't even shown me your cabin." Annette tries to smile, but it doesn't meet her eyes.

"I'm broken, Annette. I'm the one who killed you. You shouldn't spend your death with me too." He turns his back to her. He doesn't yell, doesn't threaten her. Just walks towards his shelter. He waits for an argument or anger, but instead he just hears Annette put her sandals back on and walk away. 

Later, he makes a few fixes to the shelter. Once the walls are all the same size, he starts calling it a cabin. 

#

He's trying to make curtains out of more reeds when he hears someone call his name. He fears that Annette has come back, but when he looks over he realizes that it's even worse. 

Mercedes, in a simple brown dress and a flower crown in her hair, walks towards him. Dimitri stares at her. He decides that she is not a hallucination and, unfortunately, is coming closer. He stands, sets his attempts at weaving down, and quickly walks to the cabin. He closes the door behind him. 

_Maybe she will go away…_ He presses his back against the door. There's no windows yet, since he doesn't like the idea of non-existent people being able to see inside at all times, but there's still plenty of holes in the construction of the cabin and light filters inside in uneven beams. It still makes him feel more secure than staying outside, but— 

_Knock. Knock. Knock._

"Dimitri?" Her voice is different than Dimitri remembers. Not the crushed scream of a dying woman, but the soft aria of a dove. "Dimitri, please come out. I'm not mad at you. I just want to talk." 

His shoulders are shaking. He puts a hand over his mouth, trying to shove back sobs that threatened to pour out. His eyes are squeezed shut, but he can still see Mercedes's limp body on cold cobblestones. She was struck down by Bernadetta with an arrow and an apology. The shot hadn't been clean, but Mercedes had bled out before someone could aid her. 

She had died alone. Cold. In pain. It had been Dimitri's fault. If he had fought by her side, if he had been faster or stronger, then he could have saved her. Mercedes wasn't even a native of Faerghus, but she had still died for him. 

For what? A lost cause. A monster in a dead man's skin. 

"Dimitri is dead," he says. "There is no one here for you to talk with." 

"Oh… you really believe that, don't you?" Mercedes sighs loud enough for Dimitri to hear that through the door. "Well, can I sit out here and say things for you to hear?" 

He doesn't reply. He doesn't leave. He doesn't want her to go away, but he doesn't deserve hearing her kind voice. He looks at his other hand, certain it should be covered in blood, but it is clean. All that he has ever done is destroy, break, harm, snap. Why can't Mercedes realize that? 

"I don't hold any blame to you, Dimitri, about my death. It was going to happen sooner or later, but this way at least I know that I fought against someone hurting so many people." 

"We lost," Dimitri finds himself saying. "Dedue — Everyone died. It was for nothing. Everything — our lives, our deaths — was for nothing. You should hate me, Mercedes!" He slams a hand against the wall. The entire cabin shudders.

Then it collapses around him. 

Dimitri groans as he pushes a bundle of reeds off his head. The wall leaning against him gets pushed aside. He looks around and sees that Mercedes, other than being covered in dust, is perfectly fine. A lump sticks in Dimitri’s chest. She looks at him with sympathy and he doesn't want it. He doesn't deserve it. 

"Go away, Mercedes. There is no one here for you." He almost tells her about Annette, but why burden her further if he can avoid it? 

"Well, we don't have to talk but I think I'd like to sit here a while, if you'll let me." She takes his silence as an agreement and sits down with her hands in her lap. Her hair is down and uncovered by hat or lace, which Dimitri realizes that he has missed. Is it longer than he remembered, or is that just a trick of the mind? 

Does it even matter? 

The two of them sit for quite some time. Dimitri, regardless of physical strength, should be aching from the collapsed cabin but he doesn't feel any different. A cursory mental examination proves that he is not bleeding nor is there any bruising. 

It doesn’t matter. 

"You know, I've always admired your strength. I've never been under any illusion of my own strength, and even though I know my magic is very useful, sometimes I couldn't help but wish I was like you or Ingrid. I wanted to be able to protect myself with a weapon, someone big and strong. So then, I thought, no one would ever even get close to hurting any of my friends." Mercedes sighs. "But we all have our gifts from the Goddess and we have to make the most of what She grants." 

"The Goddess abandoned us," Dimitri says. 

"No, I don't think she did." 

Dimitri barks out a laugh. "Does it even matter? We're dead." 

"I like to think that what we did in life is still important." Mercedes reaches out and places a hand on Dimitri's shoulder. He flinches but does not move away. She's warm. "You always had such a big heart, Dimitri. Your compassion matched your strength — or maybe your strength just matched your compassion. I've always looked up to that." 

"I killed all of us." 

"Edelgard killed us. You were trying to protect us."

"And I failed. A better man — a better king — would not have failed." Dimitri hunches over further, wrenching his shoulder from Mercedes's soft hand. "You can have your illusions all you want. My strength was nothing at the end. You and your healing — that is what we needed. Not more fighting."

"Oh?" 

Dimitri snorts. "I wanted to learn to heal. I begged Manuela to teach me. But for all her lessons, I could barely heal a paper cut." He holds his hands up. "I was created out of fire and death. That is all I can do, all I can inflict onto this cruel world. I shouldn't be here. I should be in hell."

Mercedes _hmphs_. "Where do you think we are?" 

"I don't know." Because Dimitri knows that Mercedes wouldn't be in hell, but he cannot be in heaven. This would be a pathetic heaven. "Is there something between heaven and hell? An endless nothingness that souls get cursed to wander? That is where we are. I managed to trap your souls with me." He barks out a cold, bitter laugh. "It wasn't enough that I ruined your lives. I had to ruin your afterlives as well." 

Mercedes is quiet, but Dimitri doesn't mistake the silence for acceptance. She's always been one to think over her words, never wanting to harm her friends. Unlike Dimitri, who failed to master grace, or Felix, who wielded words like a broadsword, Mercedes has always been a deft hand at the delicate art of tact. 

"There are stories about a third place," she says in that maddeningly soft tone, the one that makes Dimitri want to sleep and the one that makes him want to scream. She takes her flower crown off. Dimitri wonders who made it for her, or if she sat down one day and crafted it for her own pleasure. "A field of never-ending flowers and forests. A sort of in-between, not quite heaven and not quite hell. A place where souls with unfinished longing or dreams were trapped until they could resolve what stopped them from ascending to heaven." 

"It sounds like a place for people who knew they were not good, but feared hell too much," Dimitri taunts. He can't think that Mercedes has anything unfinished, but how much does he really know of her? Towards the end, he hardly spoke with anyone other than his advisors and, naturally, Dedue. He had always assumed that there would be a later for them to talk.

He had been wrong. Or maybe not. 

"Maybe. But I think that this is that place, that our souls are in limbo between good and evil." 

Dimitri has to ask the obvious. "Why would your soul be here?" 

"Because if any of my friends are trapped, then I can't have been what they needed. I'm a healer, Dimitri. My job isn't done until everyone is safe." She places her crown on Dimitri, fingers caressing his hair. Her touch feels like fire and he actually winces, pulling away with a startled grunt. "I'm sorry. I didn't think you were still in pain." 

He isn't in physical pain, but what does it matter if the ache in his chest is real or imaginary when he feels it all the same? 

"Why would you be here, Dimitri?" She asks. 

He laughs. "Why do you think?" 

"I think that you care for us. You've always cared so much. I never doubted that, not for a moment." Mercedes begins to reach out but stops. Her hand curls up by her side. "But you've never cared much for yourself, have you?" 

He doesn't answer. Mercedes, after a moment, stands. She brushes her dress off. 

"I need to find the others. If I see them, I'll tell them to look for you, okay? They would not want you to be in pain." She waits. When he says nothing, she sighs. "I am happy that we're friends, Dimitri. Hopefully I'll see you again. In this world or the next." She walks away. 

Dimitri waits for peace that never comes.


	2. Chapter 2

Dimitri waits in the ruins of his shelter, not growing hungry and not growing cold. The sun dims and brightens at what he assumes are regular intervals, but they make no sense to his head. Eventually, he closes his eyes. He waits. He’s not sure what he is waiting for, but he does. Time seems to slow, if it was passing at all to begin with — nothing’s real to him. If this is hell, it truly is a bore.

He’s lying to himself, just a bit. He knows who he’s waiting for. He knows who he is dreading seeing again. 

If his eyes are closed, he reasons, then he never needs to have that conversation. But even he cannot keep to himself forever and, one day, he opens his eyes to a familiar voice, the owner’s face peering at him with concern.

“Y-Your Highness?” Ashe questions. He yelps when Dimitri sits up and rolls his shoulders out of instinct more than actual discomfort. “S-Sorry, I didn’t know if you were real…” Ashe stands there, fidgeting with the hem of his tunic. He looks healthy. Content, if not happy. 

He’s dead. He has to be. 

A lump blocks Dimitri’s throat and he fights the urge to vomit. It’s not a surprise — Annette was there and Annette was with Ashe, wasn’t she? — but it still stings. A reminder that he has led all of his friends, all of his allies, to complete and utter ruin. 

“A worthless king is one who kills his men,” he murmurs, dropping his chin to his chest. 

“What did you say?” Ashe asks. Dimitri doesn’t bother repeating himself. He watches Ashe through half-veiled eyes, following how Ashe starts to pace back and forth. “Annette told me it was bad, but she didn’t tell me it was this bad…” Ashe trails off. He stops. He looks at Dimitri. He crosses his arms. 

It takes a moment for Dimitri to realize that Ashe is trying to be intimidating. His eyebrows are furrowed, his mouth set in a thin line, and his muscles are tensed. 

“Go away, Ashe. There is no one to talk to here.” Dimitri turns so his back is to Ashe. There’s a faint exclamation before Ashe walks so he’s in front of Dimitri again. 

Sensing that he cannot do what he did to Mercedes, Dimitri scowls. He looks at Ashe and glowers. Dimitri knows that he can be fierce, that he can look cruel. It’s something that he’s taken advantage of many times, both on and off the battlefield. When he levels the gaze at Ashe, there’s only a slight flicker of fear before Ashe’s resolve strengthens and he glares back properly this time. 

“I am not going to let you brood alone until eventually your soul fades away—”

“If only I were to be so lucky—”

“And I am not going to let you blame yourself for what happened.” Ashe lets out a breath. “You were the king of Faerghus and we all swore to fight under you, but you aren’t the reason we’re dead.”

Dimitri can’t help but laugh. “You said it yourself. I was the king. I was supposed to lead Faerghus into a new era of peace. Instead, I led her into destruction.” 

Ashe frowns as he considers his next words. “Do you think that you are Faerghus?” He gets a flat look from Dimitri in response. “Faerghus is more than just a person, isn’t it? Or are you all that Faerghus is made of?”

“No. You know I am not conceited enough to think that.” Dimitri doesn’t know where this is going. He doesn’t like it.

“Who is Faerghus then?” 

“I — I don’t know?” Dimitri is well aware that his expression has slipped from intimidating to perplexed. Ashe gives him a look. “I — Loog?” 

“He founded Faerghus, yes, but he’s not Faerghus.”

“I — I really do not know what you are trying to say, Ashe. If your goal was confounding me into communicating with you, then congratulations — you’ve succeeded.” Dimitri has a sudden thought, a question as to where this bold Ashe came from. He supposes that death will do that to a man. “I know that you want to help me, Ashe. But I am beyond your help. I am a monster. You should focus on yourself.” He means it to be reassuring, but Ashe just stomps on the ground.

“Are you even listening to yourself? _I am a monster—_ ” he drops his voice in an attempt to mimic Dimitri, but can’t get close to his baritone, “— You died to help everyone, to try to stop her from getting to us, and you still worry about us. Is that what a monster would do? You are the king of Faerghus! Death doesn’t change that.”

“I am a boar, bringer of death and harbinger of destruction,” Dimitri bellows. He stands, looming over Ashe. “The boy known as Dimitri died in Duscur amongst the ash and flames. Whatever is left has known nothing but fighting. A good king could have stopped her. A good king could have saved Faerghus—”

“I don’t believe you,” Ashe interrupts. Dimitri stops. Ashe meets his eyes. “A good king — that has nothing to do with it. You were a good king and Faerghus still lost. Faerghus lost because Edelgard had no boundaries, no qualms about what she was doing. But Faerghus is not destroyed.” 

“The capital was lost.”

“The people still live.”

Dimitri finds himself suddenly uncertain of his own position. Ashe carries on.

“Yes, it sucks. We died. Edelgard wins. She’ll take over and do what she wants but do you think that Faerghus is just going to roll over and accept it? No. The king is the leader of a nation, but he doesn’t build it. He doesn’t embody it. Hell, most people don’t even know what he looks like!”

In another circumstance, Dimitri would have commented on Ashe’s choice in words. In this moment, Dimitri couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of his current situation. Getting yelled at by Ashe in this limbo state after dying and failing to stop his own step-sister from destroying his homeland? What kind of bard would spin such a story? 

“My apologies,” Dimitri says once he has control over himself again. “It is just — I remember the last time you told me that few citizens knew what their own prince looked like. I thought that was such a shame, but now you are trying to convince me that it is not so bad.”

“Most people don’t care too much for lords and ladies and kings in far away castles,” Ashe agrees. “They worry more about the harvest and taxes and whether or not their neighbor is actually having an affair with the baker. As long as whoever rules them is just and kind, then that is what matters.” 

It’s a foreign thought, but then again, Dimitri was the prince. His entire life was built around maintaining his rule, about being a true and noble king just like his father. Even if that dream was shattered when he was but a boy, the shards still existed deep in his heart. He would either be a good king or a failure. Dimitri supposes that he is a failure, but he wonders, now with Ashe’s words swimming around him, if that is truly the same as failing Faerghus.

Dimitri was supposed to protect Faerghus. To protect everyone. 

Suddenly, Dimitri wonders whan Edelgard will do about Duscur. He hopes that someone can help them, even if he wasn’t that person. 

“I still failed, Ashe. No matter what happens next, I will be marked a failure. The king of delusion, perhaps. Or maybe I will just be erased.” Dimitri laughs again, but this time it holds no humor. “Forgotten as soon as the next generation is born. A fitting end. I am sorry to have ruined you with my association.” 

“I don’t think you’ll be forgotten.” Ashe shakes his head. He drops his arms to dangle at his sides. The last time Dimitri saw him, Ashe was in his armor. Now, he is clad in the same clothes as Dimitri. It still doesn’t quite bridge the gap that lays between them, that has always existed there. “You are more than a king, Dimitri. You are more than just a symbol of Faerghus. Maybe you just need to remember what else you lived for.”

_Your highness…_

Dimitri turns away from Ashe. He can’t look anyone in the eyes. He doesn’t deserve it. 

“The only person I ever lived for died to defend me. He should have stayed away. He… He could have left. I told him he could leave.” He feels like tearing his hair from his head, like ripping his eyes from his skull. Would it work? Would he stop seeing Dedue’s face, stop seeing that horrific transformation? “Why didn’t he leave?” Tears spring up, bubbling down Dimitri’s face in swirling rivers. 

“I think we both know why he couldn’t leave you,” Ashe says softly, “But none of us would abandon you.”

“Because I was your king?” Dimitri asks.

“Because you are our friend.” 

Silence. The wind whistles in the trees. Dimitri hears some of his ruined hut blow away. He doesn’t care. It’s peaceful in limbo. He wonders at how he can be so fortunate to be here when his own family is burning in hell. Then again, is that not the best way to torture him? He must suffer the knowledge that he is perfectly content while his loved ones exist only in agony. Even if he escapes, what then? 

Dimitri could not defeat Edelgard. How could he save his family from the Goddess? 

“I do not know what that means anymore,” Dimitri confesses. 

“I can tell you how I feel, but you’re the only one who can choose to believe.” 

A moment passes. Dimitri wishes that he could hear birds. He never really thought about how many peaceful days he would spend, listening to Dedue garden as the birds called to one another.

He wonders, idly, what it would be like to forget Dedue. The thought frightens him. He wonders if that is the purpose of this hell. 

Ashe places a hand on Dimitri’s shoulder. Dimitri only flinches a little. Ashe swallows. 

“I need to find my brother and step-father.” 

It is to be expected. Dimitri cannot ask Ashe to stay with him. He has harmed Ashe enough. He doesn’t say anything either, only inclines his head and listens to Ashe walk away. 

Once the sun begins to dim, Dimitri collects himself enough to prepare a fire. The next day, he sets about fixing his hut. He thinks of Dedue. 

#

Dimitri spends the next few cycles in isolation. He feels odd calling them days, as the sun never disappears. So cycles it is. Furthermore, there is hardly any use in tracking the passage of time. He has no way of knowing if that matters. He doesn’t think it matters most of the time. But the only thing worse than being alone is an empty mind so he settles to clearing the area around the river.

Not the entire area, of course, but enough that he soon has a hut and a firepit. He even has a pile of firewood. He makes his axe sturdier and rests with his feet in the river when he feels tired. 

He doesn’t sleep. He doesn’t need to sleep, just sits and closes his eyes for a bit. Dimitri cannot help but think that this would have been useful during the war. Still, it’s nice to not feel utterly exhausted. He even begins to fool himself into thinking that this is enough, that he will spend eternity in isolation as penance for his crimes. It could be worse. He could be haunted.

Of course, nothing that is good will ever remain if Dimitri’s entire life has any consistency to it. 

He is sitting, for once, in the shade of the forest when he hears a twig break behind him. Instincts kick in while he berrates himself for being foolish enough to let his guard down — of course he would be attacked now. Dimitri is barely able to stand when a tree branch pokes him in the side. 

“Too slow,” a voice says. Dimitri watches as Glenn, looking just like the nineteen year old that Dimitri remembers, walks out of the gloom of the trees. He’s got a long tree branch in one hand, his hair is pushed behind his ears, and he has a small smirk slashed on his face. He doesn’t look like he was mutilated, like his corpse was desecrated in fire and carved into pieces by crows. He looks young. 

Dimitri has to look down at him. He’s never had to look down at Glenn before. 

“What, can’t recognize me anymore?” Glenn asks. Dimitri can’t speak. He can’t breathe. He’s terrified, he faintly realizes. He doesn’t know when this illusion of kindness ends, when the candle blows out and reveals the truth in the shadows. “It’s me, Dima. It’s Glenn.”

“I — you died,” Dimitri says. It’s so woefully inadequate that he can’t help but feel a fool. He just can’t say anything else, can’t force his mouth to move or his throat to stop clenching tight. 

“Yeah, I did.” Glenn twirls some hair around a finger. He shrugs. “You did too. Same as my old man and the bean sprout. I could feel it as soon as you got here.” 

The realization that three Fraldariuses died to try to save Dimitri, that he brought so much pain and ruin on one family, hits him like a Demonic beast. He opens his mouth to tell Glenn to go away, but Glenn smacks him with the stick. It doesn’t even hurt, but it’s enough of a shock that all thought escapes Dimitri’s head. 

“No moping.” Glenn frowns. “I’m guessing that you missed me, buddy?” 

How can Dimitri explain? How can he even start describing the years and years and years of being haunted by Glenn’s ghost? The absolute certainty that Glenn hated him was one of the few things Dimitri held onto even as everything else slipped through his fingers. 

“I thought you blamed me,” Dimitri chokes out. 

“What? Why would you think that?” Glenn sounds like Dimitri just told him that the ocean was red. “I died to protect my friend. Do I wish that I didn’t have to? Sure, of course. But I at least got you some good years.” Glenn scowls. “Hopefully they were good.”

Dimitri hesitates. Were they? 

“They… There was good, yes.” Dimitri bites his lip. When he thinks of good, he thinks of Dedue and then he grows sad again. “Are you not mad because of your father and brother?” 

Glenn’s face goes through several emotions. “Brother?” 

“He — He goes by Felix now.” Dimitri wonders if this is what they’re going to talk about now. He wouldn’t mind. Better that than what actually lays between them. But Glenn just nods. 

“Okay. That makes sense.” Glenn clears his throat. “I’m not mad at you for my idiot father and brother dying.” To his abject horror, Dimitri feels like he’s about to burst into tears. Glenn must see it, because he frowns. “Hey, come over here.” Glenn doesn’t give Dimitri a choice, stepping forward and giving him a hug. He feels warm. He smells a bit like steel and the musk of horses. He’s short. Dimitri keeps coming back to that. 

Glenn gives good hugs. Dimitri feels odd, being able to put his arms around Glenn without any effort. But it’s a good hug. 

“I can’t believe that you grew taller than me,” Glenn mumbled.

“Sorry?” 

“Yeah, well, you should be.” There’s no venom in his voice. They don’t break away, even when it’s been a longer hug than strictly socially acceptable. “I never blamed you for my death.”

Dimitri snorts. “You should.” 

“Never. I’d do it again.” Glenn leans back just enough to look Dimitri in the eyes. “I’m mad at you for dying, though. What happened up there? For — for all of you to get stuck here.” 

Dimitri swallows, ducking his head so he doesn’t have to face Glenn. “There was a war. We lost.”

He doesn’t know what to expect, so he can only stand there when Glenn hugs him again. Glenn pats his back, something that he did when Dimitri was a kid and Felix was a kid and both of them cried at ghost stories. Dimitri’s still not entirely convinced that this is real. Maybe he will blink and Glenn will turn into smoke or blood or a demon that will finally drag him down to the pits of hell.

It’s probably unhealthy, how obsessed with hell he is. Dimitri knows that it’s ironic that he only realizes this now that he’s dead. 

“I’m sorry, Dimitri. Nothing bad should have happened to you. Nothing like — like this should have ever happened.” Glenn sounds bitter. Cold. A bit closer to the spectre that has haunted Dimitri for so long. It’s actually comforting, in a way. This is still Glenn. Dimitri wasn’t wrong about everything. “I swear, I will come back from my grave and kill whoever did this to you.”

Now Dimitri does laugh. “I did this to myself, Glenn. I should have stopped her. I should have been a better leader. None of them were brave enough to say it to my face, but I lost their trust and their respect. They should have acted on their feelings.” He considers it. “Felix did tell me. He was the only one.”

“If you were bad enough for the bean sprout to tell you off, then you must have been bad. What did you do, ban eating meat?” Glenn kids, but the smile doesn’t quite meet his eyes. “Really, Dimitri. Do you think that Faerghus is so obsessed with knighthood and kings and honor that no one would have challenged you? That my old man is so mindless that he would follow you into nothingness and destruction?”

“Yes.”

“Well — okay, no, you’re probably right. But you also would be wrong. Because my father wouldn’t follow someone he didn’t respect.” Glenn sighs. He steps back so that he can cross his arms and glare up at Dimitri, but there’s no heat in it. Dimitri suddenly has a memory of stealing sweet rolls from the kitchens and being caught by Glenn, bribing him by offering him a roll since Felix ended up not wanting it in the first place. “I wish I hadn’t died. I wish my father and my — my brother weren’t dead. But we can’t change what happened and you aren’t allowed to blame yourself.”

If only it were that easy.

Dimitri sighs. His head hangs low. His hair covers his eyes. It’s been growing — or maybe he’s just forgotten what it was like before. 

“I wish it were that easy,” Dimitri says. “I… I cannot stop but think of what could have been different. What I could have fixed. I put so much pressure on my friends in life and yet, in death, they’re the ones comforting me. It makes no sense. It just proves how selfish I am.”

“Or maybe it shows how much we care about you.” Glenn stretches his arms. “Where are you staying? Or have you been sleeping under this tree since you got here?” 

“I… built a hut.”

Glenn laughs. “Course you did. Show me?”

Dimitri doesn’t really want to show him, suddenly embarrassed by how he was trying to create this verisimilitude of real life. He had spent the entirety of the last cycle lining his circle with rocks, sort of like a garden. It helped calm him down when the thoughts got to be too much, though it also made him think of Dedue and that was never pleasant. 

Not like this. 

“If you wish.” 

Still, Dimitri leads Glenn to the hut. Glenn smiles, taking in the fire pit and the shelter and the reed mats that had taken Dimitri more effort than they probably were worth. Glenn sits down at the firepit, looking up at Dimitri. It still feels disconcerting. Glenn is dead. Has been dead for a very long time. Dimitri is used to seeing him bloody and broken. It’s hard reconciling the two visions. 

Technically, Dimitri is dead too, but he’s been dead less time. That feels important.

“I can’t stay forever,” Glenn says. “I don’t think that you want me to. But I’ll stick around for a while. I missed talking to you. We’ve got a lot to catch up on.” He’s still got a smile on his face, but it’s a bit more of a smirk. “Anyone get your eye? Or do you still have a crush on the bean sprout?” 

“Felix and I had a falling out,” Dimitri says, suddenly realizing just how much Glenn missed. Glenn still thinks he’s a human. Glenn doesn’t know about Edelgard or Dedue or Byleth. Glenn—

“Don’t overthink this,” Glenn interrupts. He pats the ground next to him. “I just want to catch up.”

Dimitri swallows. He can do that. He tells Glenn almost everything. There’s some things that he can’t share, not yet. Whether it’s his darkest moments or how he could only smile when Dedue was present — those are memories too close to his chest. It’s okay. He’s quite sure that Glenn doesn’t share everything either.

The next cycle, after the sun has dimmed and returned, Glenn takes his leave.

“I’m glad we got to talk, Dimitri, but you know I’m looking for the others. Want me to send them your way if I see them?” 

Dimitri hadn’t considered that he had an option. He wants to say no — he doesn’t deserve their time, their sympathy, their concern. But he also knows that it’s not just about him. 

He nods and considers his next words.

“If you see them… Felix or Rodrigue or any of the others…” He pauses, and then says what he really wants to say. “If you see a man from Duscur, his name is Dedue Molinaro. He’ll know of you by reputation.”

“Only good things, I hope.” Glenn smirks. He’s nineteen. He’ll be nineteen forever. At least he isn’t in pain. He doesn’t hate Dimitri. He doesn’t blame Dimitri. It’s more than Dimitri even grants himself. “But if I see him, I’ll let him know where you are. And I’ll see you again.” He looks up at the clear sky. “I don’t pretend to know where this is, but it has a way of letting us see people when we need to see them.”

He leaves. Dimitri feels a weight come off his shoulders.

#

There's a bit of Dimitri that's scared that the next person he'll see is Felix. He's not ready for that. He's not sure he'll ever be ready for that. It's with a bit of relief that Dimitri, as he struggles to weave something akin to a basket out of fiber, spots a mess of red hair making its way from the forest. 

Sylvain looks good. Dimitri's not blind. His friend has always been handsome, but as the war dragged on his smiles grew faint before disappearing altogether, circles grew under his eyes, and he lost weight. They all grew a bit more haggard. Dimitri hadn't realized just how much until he saw Sylvain, bright and healthy, in front of him.

Well, dead. But bright.

"Hey, your Highness." Sylvain waves. He's standing right outside of the area Dimitri's cleared away, plain brown boots salted lightly with dust. "Funny seeing you here."

"Sylvain." Dimitri isn't sure what to say. There's too much between them. They've never been as close as Dimitri and Ingrid or Sylvain and Felix. They're friends, they grew up together, but they were never more than just companions. Two people brought together by outside factors, just like every other relationship Dimitri has ever had. Nothing is free from his past, the crown that weighed him down until he drowned. 

"How are you doing, your Highness?" Sylvain asks. EVen here, the crown haunts him. Dimitri unsticks his tongue from the roof of his mouth. 

"Call me Dimitri, please." 

Sylvain shrugs. "Sure." He stands there. Dimitri realizes that he's holding his breath. He doesn't have to breathe, so it's an odd sensation. 

Dimitri licks his lips. 

"I'm sorry—" 

"No, no, you don't need to apologize." Sylvain shakes his head. "It was my duty. Happy to help." His tone is flat. 

"You shouldn't have died," Dimitri argues. "It wasn't fair for me to ask that of you. As your friend or your king." 

Sylvain's face goes through multiple emotions and settles somewhere in the realm of frustration. He sits down so that he is at eye level, more or less, with Dimitri. There's a few yards between them, but he's close enough that Dimitri can see the sharpness in Sylvain's eyes. It's dangerous. Dimitri can't find himself surprised. No one gets out of Faerghus in one piece, one way or another. 

"You asked me to help you, to die for you, but you never asked me to be unhappy." Sylvain flexes one of his hands, stares down at it as his mouth flattens in a straight line. "I don't hate you, Dimitri. I can't blame you for my death either. It was inevitable. We were all born for one reason: to die."

Dimitri wants to argue, but he can't. They're Faerghan men. There's never been a question between the sword and the plow. There never will be. 

"The whole system was broken. Maybe I should hate you. Maybe I should hate everyone. I don’t." Sylvain looks to the side. "Can I tell you something?" 

"Of course." 

"I hope she tears it down. I'm not happy we lost, but it was rotten. All of it. The obsession over crests and nobility, the way we fight for the sake of titles and land — it's disgusting." Sylvain narrows his eyes. "I hate it. I keep seeing everyone who I hurt. Who I lashed out at in some pitiful rebellion against my father." 

Confusion flashes across Dimitri's face. He's barely seen anyone in the vast scheme of things. Sylvain picks up on it and laughs. 

"Not literally. I wish I had. I — I keep expecting to." He swallows and actually seems to pale a little. "The more I look around, the more I expect Miklan to come out and try to kill me again." Sylvain looks haunted. 

"I understand," Dimitri says. He's had too much time to think. Encountering Dedue is a frightening concept. Seeing his father… Even knowing that Glenn doesn’t blame him isn’t the same reassurance that it should be. 

Dimitri hopes that it isn't possible. He hopes that this is a vast enough plane of existence that his father's unhappy spirit cannot find him. He hopes that, for everything he has gone through, the Goddess would spare him that. 

"We shouldn't be dead," Sylvain says. "She didn't have to fight us." Bitterness seeps into his words. Dimitri can taste it on his own tongue. 

"She should be dead for being the aggressor," Dimitri agrees. "We were protecting ourselves. She caught us off-guard, fought us like a coward." 

"We didn't have to fight at all. If she had just asked us — you're reasonable, Dimitri. You would have spoken with her." Sylvain has such conviction in his voice, Dimitri almost misses the slight waver when his name is spoken. 

Would Dimitri have been reasonable? Would he have entertained a discussion?

“You know how I would have responded,” Dimitri says diplomatically. Sylvain snorts. “Really, I know that you have your problems with the crest system, but what Edelgard is doing… Even if we had agreed, what would the nobility say? We aren’t from Adrestia. Faerghus gives her nobles their dues.”

“And look where they got us.” Sylvain shakes his head. “I just keep thinking that we could have done something different. That it didn’t have to end in a fight.”

“Faerghus is good at fighting,” Dimitri reminds him. Sylvain gives him a look. His eyebrows are drawn and his mouth is a thin line.

“Is she?” Sylvain stands. Dimitri mirrors him. Without their armor on, they’re almost the same size. If anything, Sylvain might be bigger — broader, at the very least. “I don’t think we deserved to die. But I didn’t think that I’d be here either.”

Dimitri nods. “Mercedes said that it’s some other place, an in-between.”

“Purgatory,” Sylvain breathes. “Because we are spirits with deeds left undone.”

“Yes.”

The two stare at one another. Dimitri looks away first. 

“I saw Glenn,” he tells Sylvain, though he’s not sure why. Sylvain and Glenn were companions, but they weren’t really friends. Something about Glenn’s attitude, Sylvain’s laziness — it’s why everyone has always considered Felix and Sylvain odd partners. “He said he’s looking for Felix and Rodrigue.“

“Who are you looking for, your Highness?”

Despite himself, Dimitri smiles. It’s not a pleasant smile. “No one. I… don’t deserve to talk to anyone.”

“Then what are we doing right now?” Sylvain asks. “Because if this isn’t talking, then I think I understand why you never kissed anyone in school.” He’s smiling, trying for something lighthearted, but it doesn’t quite land — a joke that’s mistimed or an acrobat that fails a dismount. Dimitri plays along, as if he doesn’t also feel like a human that’s been ripped apart and stitched back together too many times. 

“I had too much on my mind. And then, with the war… But I tried! There were those girls that got mad at me after I used your pickup lines.” Dimitri chuckles. “We were kids. Idiots.”

“I miss it,” Sylvain says.

“As do I.”

Silence. A breeze rolls over the grass. Dimitri misses the sound of songbirds. 

“Have you talked to Dedue yet?” Sylvain crosses his arms. Dimitri shakes his head. Something shifts in Sylvain’s eyes. “I hope he’s okay.”

“We’re dead. I do not think that we can be okay.”

Sylvain throws his hands up. “Well, we might as well try. It’s either that or I sit around and wait for Miklan to kill me.” He doesn’t mention that Dimitri is sitting around, sheltering in a little hut with a firepit and a trail leading to the river. He doesn’t ask who Dimitri is waiting for and whether that’s a good or bad thing.

Dimitri’s not too sure himself.

“You know, for all the shit that Faerghus put us through, I always thought you were a good king. Didn’t want to die for you, not really, but if I had to die for someone…” Sylvain shrugs. Dimitri decides to take it for the compliment that he thinks it is.

“I am happy to have known you as well, Sylvain.” Dimitri hopes that Sylvain knows that he’s being genuine. 

Regardless, Sylvain turns around and waves with one hand, a casual gesture that Dimitri has seen hundreds of times. “I’ll maybe see you around. I’m looking for Felix. If you see him, let him know.”

“Of course.” Dimitri watches Sylvain go. When he’s alone again, he finishes his basket. He lays outside for a while, wishing that the sun would set if only so he could look at the stars.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [Twitter.](https://twitter.com/ashes8012)


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